Ethel Hueston

"IF Jim doesn't ask for a date for the concert next week, Lark, let's snub him good."

"But we both have dates," protested Lark.

"What difference does that make? We mustn't let him get independent. He always has asked one of us, and he needn't think we shall let him off now."

"Oh, don't worry," interrupted Connie. "He always asks. You have that same discussion every time there's anything going on. It's just a waste of time."

Mr. Starr looked up from his mail. "Soup of boys, and salad of boys,—they're beginning to pall on my palate."

"Very classy expression father," approved Carol. "Maybe you can work it into a sermon."

"Complexion and boys with Carol, books and boys with Lark, Connie, if you begin that nonsense you'll get spanked. One member of my family shall rise above it if I have to do it with force."

Connie blushed.

The twins broke into open derision. "Connie! Oh, yes, Connie's above that nonsense."

"Connie's the worst in the family, father, only she's one of these reserved, supercilious souls who doesn't tell everything she knows."

"'Nonsense.' I wish father could have heard Lee Hanson last night. It would have been a revelation to him. 'Aw, go on, Connie, give us a kiss.'"

Connie caught her lips between her teeth. Her face was scarlet.

"Twins!"

"It's a fact, father. He kept us awake. 'Aw, go on, Connie, be good to a fellow.'"

"That's what makes us so pale to-day,—he kept us awake hours!"

"Carol!"

"Well, quite a while anyhow."

"I—I—" began Connie defensively.

"Well, we know it. Don't interrupt when we're telling things. You always spoil a good story by cutting in. 'Aw, go on, Connie, go on now!' And Connie said—" The twins rocked off in a paroxysm of laughter, and Connie flashed a murderous look at them.

"Prudence says listening is—"

"Sure she does, and she's right about it, too. But what can a body do when folks plant themselves right beneath your window to pull off their little Romeo concerto. We can't smother on nights like these. 'Aw, go on, Connie.'"

"I wanted to drop a pillow on his head, but Carol was afraid he'd run off with the pillow, so we just sacrificed ourselves and let it proceed."

"Well, I—"

"Give us time, Connie. We're coming to that. And Connie said, 'I'm going in now, I'm sleepy.'"

"I didn't—father, I didn't!"

"Well, you might have said a worse thing than that," he told her sadly.

"I mean—I—"

"She did say it," cried the twins. "'I'm sleepy.' Just like that."

"Oh, Connie's the girl for sentiment," exclaimed Lark. "Sleepy is not a romantic word and it's not a sentimental feeling, but it can be drawled out so it sounds a little mushy at least. 'I sleep, my love, to dream of thee,'—for instance. But Connie didn't do it that way. Nix. Just plain sleep, and it sounded like 'Get out, and have a little sense.'"

"Well, it would make you sick," declared Connie, wrinkling up her nose to express her disgust. "Are boys always like that father?"

"Don't ask me," he hedged promptly. "How should I know?"

"Oh, Connie, how can you! There's father—now, he never cared to kiss the girls even in his bad and balmy days, did you, daddy? Oh, no, father was all for the strictly orthodox even in his youth!"

Mr. Starr returned precipitately to his mail, and the twins calmly resumed the discussion where it had been interrupted.

A little later a quick exclamation from their father made them turn to him inquiringly.

"It's a shame," he said, and again: "What a shame!"

The girls waited expectantly. When he only continued frowning at the letter in his hand, Carol spoke up brightly, "Yes, isn't it?"

Even then he did not look up, and real concern settled over their expressive faces. "Father! Can't you see we're listening?"

He looked up, vaguely at first, then smiling. "Ah, roused your curiosity, did I? Well, it's just another phase of this eternal boy question."

Carol leaned forward ingratiatingly. "Now indeed, we are all absorption."

"Why, it's a letter from Andrew Hedges,—an old college chum of mine. His son is going west and Andy is sending him around this way to see me and meet my family. He'll be here this afternoon. Isn't it a shame?"

"Isn't it lovely?" exclaimed Carol. "We can use him to make Jim Forrest jealous if he doesn't ask for that date?" And she rose up and kissed her father.

"Will you kindly get back to your seat, young lady, and not interfere with my thoughts?" he reproved her sternly but with twinkling eyes. "The trouble is I have to go to Fort Madison on the noon train for that Epworth League convention. I'd like to see that boy. Andy's done well, I guess. I've always heard so. He's a millionaire, they say."

For a long second his daughters gazed at him speechlessly.

Then, "A millionaire's son," Lark faltered feebly.

"Yes."

"Why on earth didn't you say so in the first place?" demanded Carol.

"What difference does that make?"

"It makes all the difference in the world! Ah! A millionaire's son." She looked at Lark with keen speculative eyes. "Good-looking, I suppose, young, of course, and impressionable. A millionaire's son."

"But I have to go to Fort Madison. I am on the program to-night. There's the puzzle."

"Oh, father, you can leave him to us," volunteered Lark.

"I'm afraid you mightn't carry it off well. You're so likely to run by fits and jumps, you know. I should hate it if things went badly."

"Oh, father, things couldn't go badly," protested Carol. "We'll be lovely, just lovely. A millionaire's son! Oh, yes, daddy, you can trust him to us all right."

At last he caught the drift of their enthusiasm. "Ah! I see! That fatal charm. You're sure you'll treat him nicely?"

"Oh, yes, father, so sure. A millionaire's son. We've never even seen one yet."

"Now look here, girls, fix the house up and carry it off the best you can. I have a lot of old friends in Cleveland, and I want them to think I've got the dandiest little family on earth."

"'Dandiest'! Father, you will forget yourself in the pulpit some day,—you surely will. And when we take such pains with you, too, I can't understand where you get it! The people you associate with, I suppose."

"Do your best, girls. I'm hoping for a good report. I'll be gone until the end of the week, since I'm on for the last night, too. Will you do your best?"

After his departure, Carol gathered the family forces about her without a moment's delay.

"A millionaire's son," she prefaced her remarks, and as she had expected, was rewarded with immediate attention. "Now, for darling father's sake, we've got to manage this thing the very best we can. We have to make this Andy Hedges, Millionaire's Son, think we're just about all right, for father's sake. We must have a gorgeous dinner, to start with. We'll plan that a little later. Now I think, Aunt Grace, lovely, it would be nice for you to wear your lavender lace gown, and look delicate, don't you? A chaperoning auntie in poor health is so aristocratic. You must wear the lavender satin slippers and have a bottle of cologne to lift frequently to your sensitive nostrils."

"Why, Carol, William wouldn't like it!"

"Wouldn't like it!" ejaculated the schemer in surprise. "Wouldn't like it! Why wouldn't he like it? Didn't he tell us to create a good impression? Well, this is it. You'll make a lovely semi-invalid auntie. You must have a faintly perfumed handkerchief to press to your eyes now and then. It isn't hot enough for you slowly to wield a graceful fan, but we can get along without it."

"But, Carol—"

"Think how pleased dear father will be if his old college chum's son is properly impressed," interrupted Carol hurriedly, and proceeded at once with her plans.

"Connie must be a precocious younger sister, all in white,—she must come in late with a tennis racquet, as though she had just returned from a game. That will be stagey, won't it? Lark must be the sweet young daughter of the home. She must wear her silver mull, her gray slippers, and—"

"I can't," said Lark. "I spilt grape juice on it. And I kicked the toe out of one of my slippers."

"You'll have to wear mine then. Fortunately that silver mull was always too tight for me and I never comported myself in it with freedom and destructive ease. As a consequence, it is fresh and charming. You must arrange your hair in the most Ladies' Home Journal style, and—"

"What are you going to wear?"

"Who, me? Oh, I have other plans for myself." Carol looked rather uneasily at her aunt. "I'll come to me a little later."

"Yes, indeed," said Connie. "Carol has something extra up her sleeve. She's had the millionaire's son in her mind's eye ever since father introduced his pocketbook into the conversation."

Carol was unabashed. "My interest is solely from a family view-point. I have no ulterior motive."

Her eyes sparkled eagerly. "You know, auntie darling—"

"Now, Carol, don't you suggest anything—"

"Oh, no indeed, dearest, how could you think of such a thing?" disclaimed Carol instantly. "It's such a very tiny thing, but it will mean a whole lot on the general impression of a millionaire's son. We've simply got to have a maid! To open the door, and curtesy, and take his hat, and serve the dinner, and—He's used to it, you know, and if we haven't one, he'll go back to Cleveland and say, 'Ah, bah Jove, I had to hang up my own hat, don't you know?'"

"That's supposed to be English, but I don't believe it. Anyhow, it isn't Cleveland," said Connie flatly.

"Well, he'd think we were awfully cheap and hard up, and Andy Hedges, Senior, would pity father, and maybe send him ten dollars, and—no, we've got to have a maid!"

"We might get Mamie Sickey," suggested Lark.

"She's so ugly."

"Or Fay Greer," interposed Aunt Grace.

"She'd spill the soup."

"Then there's nobody but Ada Lone," decided Connie.

"She hasn't anything fit to wear," objected Carol.

"Of whom were you thinking, Carol?" asked her aunt, moving uneasily in her chair.

Carol flung herself at her aunt's knees. "Me!" she cried.

"As usual?" Connie ejaculated dryly.

"Oh, Carol," wailed Lark, "we can't think of things to talk about when you aren't there to keep us stirred up."

"I'm beginning to see daylight," said Connie. She looked speculatively at Lark. "Well, it's not half bad, Carol, and I apologize."

"Don't you think it is a glorious idea, Connie?" cried Carol rapturously.

"Yes, I think it is."

Carol caught her sister's hand. Here was an ally worth having. "You know how sensible Connie is, auntie. She sees how utterly preposterous it would be to think of entertaining a millionaire's son without a maid."

"You're too pretty," protested Lark. "He'd try to kiss you."

"'Oh, no, sir, oh, please, sir,'" simpered Carol, with an adorable curtesy, "'you'd better wait for the ladies, sir.'"

"Oh, Carol, I think you're awful," said their aunt unhappily. "I know your father won't like it."

"Like it? He'll love it. Won't he, Connie?"

"Well, I'm not sure he'll be crazy about it, but it'll be all over when he gets home," said Connie.

"And you're very much in favor of it, aren't you, Connie precious?"

"Yes, I am." Connie looked at Lark critically again. "We must get Lark some bright flowers to wear with the silver dress—sweet peas would be good. But I won't pay for them, and you can put that down right now."

"But what's the idea?" mourned Lark. "What's the sense in it? Father said to be good to him, and you know I can't think of things to say to a millionaire's son. Oh, Carol, don't be so mean."

"You must practise up. You must be girlish, and light-hearted, and ingenuous, you know. That'll be very effective."

"You do it, Carol. Let me be the maid. You're lots more effective than I am."

But Carol stood firm, and the others yielded to her persuasions. They didn't approve, they didn't sanction, but they did get enthusiastic, and a merrier houseful of masqueraders was never found than that. Even Aunt Grace allowed her qualms to be quieted and entered into her part as semi-invalid auntie with genuine zest.

At three they were all arrayed, ready for the presentation. They assembled socially in the parlor, the dainty maid ready to fly to her post at a second's warning. At four o'clock, they were a little fagged and near the point of exasperation, but they still held their characters admirably. At half past four a telegraph message was phoned out from the station.

"Delayed in coming. Will write you later. Very sorry. Andy Hedges, Jr."

Only the absolute ludicrousness of it saved Carol from a rage. She looked from the girlish tennis girl to the semi-invalid auntie, and then to the sweet young daughter of the home, and burst out laughing. The others, though tired, nervous and disappointed, joined her merrily, and the vexation was swept away.

The next morning, Aunt Grace went as usual to the all-day meeting of the Ladies' Aid in the church parlors. Carol and Lark, with a light lunch, went out for a few hours of spring-time happiness beside the creek two miles from town.

"We'll come back right after luncheon," Carol promised, "so if Andy the Second should come, we'll be on hand."

"Oh, he won't come to-day."

"Well, he just better get here before father comes home. I know father will like our plan after it's over, but I also know he'll veto it if he gets home in time. Wish you could go with us, Connie."

"Thanks. But I've got to sew on forty buttons. And—if I pick the cherries on the little tree, will you make a pie for dinner?"

"Yes. If I'm too tired Larkie will. Do pick them, Con, the birds have had more than their share now."

After her sisters had disappeared, Connie considered the day's program.

"I'll pick the cherries while it's cool. Then I'll sew on the buttons. Then I'll call on the Piersons, and they'll probably invite me to stay for luncheon." And she went up-stairs to don a garment suitable for cherry-tree service. For cherry trees, though lovely to behold when laden with bright red clusters showing among the bright green leaves, are not at all lovely to climb into. Connie knew that by experience. Belonging to a family that wore its clothes as long as they possessed any wearing virtue, she found nothing in her immediate wardrobe fitted for the venture. But from a rag-bag in the closet at the head of the stairs, she resurrected some remains of last summer's apparel. First she put on a blue calico, but the skirt was so badly torn in places that it proved insufficiently protecting. Further search brought to light another skirt, pink, in a still worse state of delapidation. However, since the holes did not occur simultaneously in the two garments, by wearing both she was amply covered. For a waist she wore a red crape dressing sacque, and about her hair she tied a broad, ragged ribbon of red to protect the soft waves from the ruthless twigs. She looked at herself in the mirror. Nothing daunted by the sight of her own unsightliness, she took a bucket and went into the back yard.

Gingerly she climbed into the tree, gingerly because Connie was not fond of scratches on her anatomy, and then began her task. It was a glorious morning. The birds, frightened away by the living scare-crow in the tree, perched in other, cherry-less trees around her and burst into derisive song. And Connie, light-hearted, free from care, in love with the whole wide world, sang, too, pausing only now and then to thrust a ripe cherry between her teeth.

She did not hear the prolonged ringing of the front-door bell. She did not observe the young man in the most immaculate of white spring suits who came inquiringly around the house. But when the chattering of a saucy robin became annoying, she flung a cherry at him crossly.

"Oh, chase yourself!" she cried. And nearly fell from her perch in dismay when a low voice from beneath said pleasantly:

"I beg your pardon! Miss Starr?"

Connie swallowed hard, to get the last cherry and the mortification out of her throat.

"Yes," she said, noting the immaculate white spring suit, and the handsome shoes, and the costly Panama held so lightly in his hand. She knew the Panama was costly because they had wanted to buy one for her father's birthday, but decided not to.

"I am Andrew Hedges," he explained, smiling sociably.

Connie wilted completely at that. "Good night," she muttered with a vanishing mental picture of their lovely preparations the day previous. "I—mean good morning. I'm so glad to meet you. You—you're late, aren't you? I mean, aren't you ahead of yourself? At least, you didn't write, did you?"

"No, I was not detained so long as I had anticipated, so I came right on. But I'm afraid I'm inconveniencing you."

"Oh, not a bit, I'm quite comfortable," she assured him. "Auntie is gone just now, and the twins are away, too, but they'll all be back presently." She looked longingly at the house. "I'll have to come down, I suppose."

"Let me help you," he offered eagerly. Connie in the incongruous clothes, with the little curls straying beneath the ragged ribbon, and with stains of cherry on her lips, looked more presentable than Connie knew.

"Oh, I—" she hesitated, flushing. "Mr. Hedges," she cried imploringly, "will you just go around the corner until I get down. I look fearful."

"Not a bit of it," he said. "Let me take the cherries."

Connie helplessly passed them down to him, and saw him carefully depositing them on the ground. "Just give me your hand."

And what could Connie do? She couldn't sternly order a millionaire's son to mosy around the house and mind his own business until she got some decent clothes on, though that was what she yearned to do. Instead she held out a slender hand, grimy and red, with a few ugly scratches here and there, and allowed herself to be helped ignominiously out from the sheltering branches into the garish light of day.

She looked at him reproachfully. He never so much as smiled.

"Laugh if you like," she said bitterly. "I looked in the mirror. I know all about it."

"Run along," he said, "but don't be gone long, will you? Can you trust me with the cherries?"

Connie walked into the house with great decorum, afraid the ragged skirts might swing revealingly, but the young man bent over the cherries while she made her escape.

It was another Connie who appeared a little later, a typical tennis girl, all in white from the velvet band in her hair to the canvas shoes on her dainty feet. She held out the slender hand, no longer grimy and stained, but its whiteness still marred with sorry scratches.

"I am glad to see you," she said gracefully, "though I can only pray you won't carry a mental picture of me very long."

"I'm afraid I will though," he said teasingly.

"Then please don't paint me verbally for my sisters' ears; they are always so clever where I am concerned. It is too bad they are out. You'll stay for luncheon with me, won't you? I'm all alone,—we'll have it in the yard."

"It sounds very tempting, but—perhaps I had better come again later in the afternoon."

"You may do that, too," said Connie. "But since you are here, I'm afraid I must insist that you help amuse me." And she added ruefully, "Since I have done so well amusing you this morning."

"Why, he's just like anybody else," she was thinking with relief. "It's no trouble to talk to him, at all. He's nice in spite of the millions. Prudence says millionaires aren't half so dollar-marked as they are cartooned, anyhow."

He stayed for luncheon, he even helped carry the folding table out beneath the cherry tree, and trotted docilely back and forth with plates and glasses, as Connie decreed.

"Oh, father," she chuckled to herself, as she stood at the kitchen window, twinkling at the sight of the millionaire's son spreading sandwiches according to her instructions. "Oh, father, the boy question is complicated, sure enough."

It was not until they were at luncheon that the grand idea visited Connie. Carol would have offered it harborage long before. Carol's mind worked best along that very line. It came to Connie slowly, but she gave it royal welcome. Back to her remembrance flashed the thousand witty sallies of Carol and Lark, the hundreds of times she had suffered at their hands. And for the first time in her life, she saw a clear way of getting even. And a millionaire's son! Never was such a revenge fairly crying to be perpetrated.

"Will you do something for me, Mr. Hedges?" she asked. Connie was only sixteen, but something that is born in woman told her to lower her eyes shyly, and then look up at him quickly beneath her lashes. She was no flirt, but she believed in utilizing her resources. And she saw in a flash that the ruse worked.

Then she told him softly, very prettily.

"But won't she dislike me if I do?" he asked.

"No, she won't," said Connie. "We're a family of good laughers. We enjoy a joke nearly as much when it's on us, as when we are on top."

So it was arranged, and shortly after luncheon the young man in the immaculate spring suit took his departure. Then Connie summoned her aunt by phone, and told her she must hasten home to help "get ready for the millionaire's son." It was after two when the twins arrived, and Connie and their aunt hurried them so violently that they hadn't time to ask how Connie got her information.

"But I hope I'm slick enough to get out of it without lying if they do ask," she told herself. "Prudence says it's not really wicked to get out of telling things if we can manage it."

He had arrived! A millionaire's son! Instantly their enthusiasm returned to them. The cushions on the couch were carefully arranged for the reclining of the semi-invalid aunt, who, with the sweet young daughter of the home, was up-stairs waiting to be summoned. Connie, with the tennis racquet, was in the shed, waiting to arrive theatrically. Carol, in her trim black gown with a white cap and apron, was a dream.

And when he came she ushered him in, curtesying in a way known only on the stage, and took his hat and stick, and said softly:

"Yes, sir,—please come in, sir,—I'll call the ladies."

She knew she was bewitching, of course, since she had done it on purpose, and she lifted her eyes just far enough beneath the lashes to give the properly coquettish effect. He caught her hand, and drew her slowly toward him, admiration in his eyes, but trepidation in his heart, as he followed Connie's coaching. But Carol was panic-seized, she broke away from him roughly and ran up-stairs, forgetting her carefully rehearsed. "Oh, no, sir,—oh, please, sir,—you'd better wait for the ladies."

But once out of reach she regained her composure. The semi-invalid aunt trailed down the stairs, closely followed by the attentive maid to arrange her chair and adjust the silken shawl. Mr. Hedges introduced himself, feeling horribly foolish in the presence of the lovely serving girl, and wishing she would take herself off. But she lingered effectively, whisperingly softly:

"Shall I lower the window, madame? Is it too cool? Your bottle, madame!"

And the guest rubbed his hand swiftly across his face to hide the slight twitching of his lips.

Then the model maid disappeared, and presently the sweet daughter of the house, charming in the gray silk mull and satin slippers, appeared, smiling, talking, full of vivacity and life. And after a while the dashing tennis girl strolled in, smiling inscrutably into the eyes that turned so quizzically toward her. For a time all went well. The chaperoning aunt occasionally lifted a dainty cologne bottle to her sensitive nostrils, and the daughter of the house carried out her girlish vivacity to the point of utter weariness. Connie said little, but her soul expanded with the foretaste of triumph.

"Dinner is served, madame," said the soft voice at the door, and they all walked out sedately. Carol adjusted the invalid auntie's shawl once more, and was ready to go to the kitchen when a quiet:

"Won't Miss Carol sit down with us?" made her stop dead in her tracks.

He had pulled a chair from the corner up to the table for her, and she dropped into it. She put her elbows on the table, and leaning her dainty chin in her hands, gazed thoughtfully at Connie, whose eyes were bright with the fires of victory.

"Ah, Connie, I have hopes of you yet,—you are improving," she said gently. "Will you run out to the kitchen and bring me a bowl of soup, my child?"

And then came laughter, full and free,—and in the midst of it Carol looked up, wiping her eyes, and said:

"I'm sorry now I didn't let you kiss me, just to shock father!"

But the visit was a great success. Even Mr. Starr realized that. The millionaire's son remained in Mount Mark four days, the cynosure of all eyes, for as Carol said, "What's the use of bothering with a millionaire's son if you can't brag about him."

And his devotion to his father's college chum was such that he wrote to him regularly for a long time after, and came westward now and again to renew the friendship so auspiciously begun.

"But you can't call him a problem, father," said Carol keenly. "They aren't problematic until they discriminate. And he doesn't. He's as fond of Connie's conscience as he is of my complexion, as far as I can see." She rubbed her velvet skin regretfully. She had two pimples yesterday and he never even noticed them. Then she leaned forward and smiled. "Father, you keep an eye on Connie. There's something in there that we aren't on to yet." And with this cryptic remark, Carol turned her attention to a small jar of cold cream the druggist had given her to sample.